


Carefully Everywhere Descending

by Jane St Clair (3jane)



Category: Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-08
Updated: 2011-08-08
Packaged: 2017-10-22 09:56:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/236804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3jane/pseuds/Jane%20St%20Clair
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Obi-Wan is willing to accept that his Master wants a new<br/>Padawan, but his composure is only skin deep.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Carefully Everywhere Descending

He was well-behaved, but he was always well-behaved.  His objections to  
Qui-Gon's behaviour toward the council had been routine, and he had been  
routinely scolded for them. *I will do what I must, Obi-Wan.*  All his  
obedience had surfaced, then, and he'd used it as a shield for the rest  
of the day and into the night.  After he left his Master, he found  
Anakin and took the boy to bed, settling him in one of the child-rooms  
left vacant and ready for visitors to the Temple.  He spent almost an  
hour there in the near-darkness, telling the boy a story and rocking him  
to sleep, then enveloping the tiny body in as many extra blankets as he  
could gather without notice.  Anakin shivered all the time.  Obi-Wan had  
some memory of what it was like to be small and alone in the hugeness of  
the Temple, and he was reluctant to leave until he was certain that the  
child was securely asleep.

It occurred to him that stressed children, like certain kinds of  
animals, bonded with whomever showed them the slightest kindness, but he  
didn't expect Anakin to develop any kind of affection for him.  Whatever  
love the boy had belonged to Qui-Gon.  Obi-Wan was simply a warm body  
generating some kind of security in a shockingly sterile maze of parquet  
halls and plexisteel views.

Even after he could feel Anakin vividly dreaming, Obi-Wan stayed seated  
on the floor of the darkened room.  He'd never been able to sleep with  
that kind of security; even as a tiny boy he'd been restlessly  
insomniac.  When he'd meditated on his earliest memories, the sensations  
that rose were of lying in the dark, listening to a dozen or more other  
children breathe in the dim night-light of the Academy creche.  As a  
child, it had taken him so long to fall asleep that he'd been deeply  
certain that he didn't sleep at all.  He was one to both drift and wake  
very gradually.  Mediation had helped, but only the experience of being  
startled out of dreams had finally confirmed for him that he had human  
circadian rhythms.

Meditation didn't come, only the nagging understanding that his presence  
was doing nothing further for the boy.  Obi-Wan gathered himself and  
left, paced back to his own rooms by the Temple's peripheral halls.  The  
wall-lights were at a traditional half-burn that indicated deep night in  
the unnatural Coruscant environment.  There were huge treatises in the  
Academy library on the inappropriateness of the city-planet as a home  
for the Jedi.  Obi-Wan supposed that the continued existence of the  
central hall in this place was a rare gesture of political expediency on  
the order's part.

He had quarters of his own, though from the earliest time of his  
apprenticeship he was more accustomed to sleeping in Qui-Gon's.  Obi-Wan  
used his private room largely for storage, neither wishing to add  
clutter to his Master's Spartan existence nor quite willing yet to throw  
his childhood away.

There was dust on everything.  By running his hand over a given surface,  
he could feel the tiny remnants of the Force that clung to the  
microscopic fragments of skin and hair.  They had flashes of lives  
attached, but too fleeting for him to reconstruct anything meaningful  
from them.

He found what he was looking for in the clothes-chest tucked between the  
corner and the first of two slightly curving windows.  The robe unfolded  
slowly, pooling on the ground at Obi-Wan's feet even as he held the hood  
and shoulders folded over his arm.  The fabric was meaningless and the  
smell long gone, but the living signature was there.  Half a decade  
before, the robe had been Qui-Gon's, given to Obi-Wan in the last hours  
of a particularly wretched mission.  He'd been freezing cold and wet,  
standing with his Master on a landing pad on a planet that hadn't  
welcomed them and which shortly after demanded that they leave.  He'd  
been so amazingly tired.  Qui-Gon had caught him just out of the corner  
of his eye as he began to rock with exhaustion, and shifted without  
breaking the flow of his conversation to strip off his outermost garment  
and wrap his trembling student in it.  Obi-Wan remembered sleeping and  
waking, still wrapped in the coat with his head pillowed on his Master's  
legs while they both sat on the floor of the ship that was taking them  
home.  Qui-Gon had never asked for the robe back, and Obi-Wan hadn't  
offered it.

It was what he wanted at the moment.  Obi-Wan stripped absently and  
wrapped himself in the almost-black folds of the garment.  His bed,  
which he hadn't slept in more that three times in the past five years,  
was in the corner, and he found it instinctively.  The position he  
folded himself into was semi-fetal, letting the cloth gather in the  
creases of his legs and clutching the excess against his chest.

Qui-Gon was going to give him up.  At that hour of the night, he was  
beyond all logical understanding of his Master's reasons, and even  
beyond his belief that he could take the trials and become a knight.    
His shivering misery was of a sort that he hadn't experienced in over a  
decade, when he'd been a child that no one wanted on any terms.  He  
hadn't realized the extent to which Qui-Gon had become the force he  
balanced himself against.  Lying in the dark, he wasn't at all sure that  
he was capable of functioning without it.

***

He woke to the sensation of a hand on his back, rubbing in long, uneven  
circles.  His face was rigid with what he gradually realized was dried  
salt.  He'd cried himself to sleep; that he remembered.  They hadn't  
been the tears he wanted, the wild, despairing ones, but he'd been sure  
that if he let go to that extent, he wouldn't be able to reconstruct  
himself.  All he'd achieved was quiet misery, crying into his pillow and  
the folds of the robe.

"Shhh.  Are you all right?"  Qui-Gon's voice.  

"Master." *Mahstah.*  His own accent too thick with his exhaustion.  He  
pulled himself upright, automatically pulling the folds close enough  
around him that only his face and hands, and the tips of his feet were  
visible.

"You frightened me, Obi-Wan.  You didn't come back to our quarters after  
you left Anakin.  I was hours trying to imagine where you might be."  

He knew where Qui-Gon was, his Master was a shimmering body within the  
Force, but it took a long time for him to focus his eyes on the shape  
kneeling beside the bed.  The hand on his back had fallen away when he  
sat up, but it rested by his hip, very still on the undisturbed blanket.  
"Obi-Wan, what are you doing here?"

He was too tired to put any kind of armour on his words.  "You're going  
to give me up."  Once he'd said it, a part of him wanted to scream all  
his rage out.  He'd been very, very good for as much of his life as he  
could remember.  He had obeyed and innovated and listened and learned  
and negotiated and all of it was ultimately worthless because Qui-Gon  
was going to give him up without any warning and take Anakin to train,  
keep the boy and rock him and comfort him, and Obi-Wan would have to get  
used again to sleeping in a room this silent.  For a score of his  
twenty-five years, he hadn't gotten really angry. *There is no emotion;  
there is peace.  There is no passion; there is serenity.*

The scream building inside him had to be twisting the Force it was so  
powerful.  //I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING WRONG!//

He couldn't remember the last time Qui-Gon had rocked him, but suddenly  
Obi-Wan was in his Master's lap, gathered up into a tight ball of flesh  
and clothing, and the older man was whispering into his hair.  Very  
softly, "No, no Obi-Wan.  You didn't do anything wrong.  You didn't.    
You didn't.  I still love you.  It's all right.  I'm so sorry, Padawan."

The scream never emerged, but he was crying harder than he had since  
early childhood.  He sobbed until he was sure he was going to be sick,  
ripping out all the anxiety in himself that he could reach and shrieking  
it into Qui-Gon's chest.  It was the least dignified he had been in his  
adult life.  Qui-Gon was very still against him, almost silent and  
shifting his hands only a little to keep his apprentice from falling or  
hitting himself.  Gradually, Obi-Wan cried himself out.  He stayed  
curled against his Master's body, too humiliated to raise his face.  The  
older man raised a hand to the bent neck and stroked it, waiting.

So softly he could barely hear it, "Obi-Wan."

"M-Master?"

"Is this mine?"

He realized that Qui-Gon's fingers were tangled in the robe.  Of course  
he would recognize it as his own; his signature was ingrained in the  
cross-weave of it.  He wondered if the Master had yet discovered that  
his Padawan was naked underneath the stolen garment.

"Yes."  His own voice was only a shivering choke.

"How long had you been crying?"

"I don't know.  A while."

"In my robe."

"Yes."

Fingers stroked down his neck and slid beneath the robe at the point  
where his shoulders widened.  He could feel his Master's touch stiffen  
suddenly as he realized the bareness of the man in his arms.  It was  
going to ruin him in a minute, that touch, but he could feel it all  
along his spine, too good to give up.  It didn't leave, though, and  
after a moment it softened, and the back rub continued on the robe's  
exterior.  Qui-Gon's other hand braced his shoulder and shook him a  
little.

"Listen to me, Padawan.  I have no intention of sending you away.  I  
meant only that I believed you to be an adult and a warrior, and that  
you were my equal.  I am sorry I did not speak with you before I spoke  
to the council."

Obi-Wan looked at him with a child's misery, curling even his  
extremities protectively under the almost-black cloth.  He wanted badly  
to be alone to nurse his misery and quiet lust until morning.  Even  
after what was likely several hours' sleep, he was still so tired his  
teeth chattered, and he was shaking with humiliation.  In a few moments,  
his body was going to betray him and he would have no excuses at all.    
It would have made him very happy to disappear.

"Obi-Wan, look at me."  

He looked.  Qui-Gon's hands clamped around his jaw and he found himself  
staring into flaming blue eyes, so close he could smell the day's  
signatures of smoke and sweat in his Master's hair.

He didn't know what shimmer of the Force pushed him to do it, but he  
leaned forward and kissed Qui-Gon hard on the mouth.  It was closer to  
the smell and feeling of his Master than he'd ever been in his life, and  
his need to stay there effectively repressed all the screaming    
rationality of his brain.  Qui-Gon's beard was soft against his own  
clean-shaven face, and he could feel the narrow lines of the older man's  
lips against his mouth.  For a split second, the man's mouth softened  
and almost opened; he could feel the flare of lust which wasn't entirely  
his own run down the length of his spine.

Then he was forcefully back, held away by heavy arms and an almost-  
visible shield.  The blue eyes staring at him held a great deal of  
something he couldn't read.  At any other time Obi-Wan might have  
flinched, but he was far beyond humiliation, and all he could register  
was the desire and the need for contact shrieking up and down his body.    
"I think, Padawan, that you are not quite awake."

"Master," (*Mahstah* again, his mouth was so numb from that contact), "I  
\--"

"Come, Obi-Wan."  Qui-Gon thrust himself upright and away.  Halfway  
across the room, he stooped and gathered up Obi-Wan's discarded  
clothing.  "I think you will sleep better in our quarters.  You can come  
as you are."

There wasn't anything he could say to that.  He followed his Master  
barefoot through corridors that contained only a very few people, none  
of whom spared them more than a tired glance.  The walk shook the last  
tiredness out of his mind; the climate-controlled chill of the small  
hours of the dark cycle slipped under the robe and reminded Obi-Wan both  
of his near-nakedness and of the lines of his own body.  By the time  
they had completed the perimeter walk and risen the two necessary  
levels, the shivering self-pity had evaporated and he was very close to  
being angry again.

He'd forgotten the length of the nights on Coruscant.  The pre-dawn  
period in which the Jedi traditionally rose was still hours away.  The  
off-set day disoriented him: he hadn't been on Coruscant for any length  
of time since his childhood, and the periods he spent there with his  
Master had tended to be made of up snatched sleep and frantic    
organization for the next mission.  More often than not, his training  
had taken place in the emptier parts of their assignment worlds, where  
his existence with the living Force was less a matter of effort and more  
one of existence within a dense biome.  It was the only thing of peace  
he'd been given -- those moments of stillness within a natural place,  
psychically cradled by his Master while he pushed his limits outward.

In contrast, the city-planet made him restless and oddly rigid.  When  
Qui-Gon palmed open the door to their -- his -- quarters, Obi-Wan  
stepped past him and stood so awkwardly that even his own reflection in  
the darkened windows startled him.  His face was raw and too open; he  
could see his own resentment in the glass.  

"Sit down, Obi-Wan.  Talk to me."  Qui-Gon had settled soundlessly,  
folding his huge self into a position of such serenity that Obi-Wan  
stared at him a little.

"Mas--"

"You can tell me anything you like.  I want you to speak for a while."

The pallet in the corner had been his since he was a narrow-bodied  
adolescent, and he settled onto it with the force of old habit.  It  
would have been customary for him to kneel, or sit cross-legged, but his  
body's reaction was to pull close together, and he found himself with  
his knees pulled up to his chest.  He started talking with his face  
almost buried in his robe-covered knees; Qui-Gon was totally hidden from  
his line of sight.

"When I was fifteen, we went on a diplomatic mission to Tofino, and  
afterwards you took me away to the seacoast there to train.  We stayed  
in a hostel, it was huge and so stark it felt like an institution.  I  
remember thinking that the owner must have had Jedi training, because it  
looked so much like the Temple, the rooms just a bed, a chair, and a  
wash stand, not even a writing table or a desk.  You took me running  
along the beach.  It was remarkable -- volcanic, I think -- there were  
hollows in the rocks that filled with water at low tide, and there were  
so many small creatures in them.

"The beaches had the finest sand I'd ever encountered, and it got in  
everything.  All my clothes were full of it, and it was in my hair and  
the hollows of my ears.  The rooms didn't have private bath facilities,  
there were only bathing rooms on every floor.  The one on our floor had  
three bathtubs, I think, all free-standing, and its plumbing was  
exposed.  I was bathing there, late in the afternoon, when you came in.    
I must have looked like a drowned rat to you -- I had been immersing my  
head to rinse the sand away.  You didn't bathe, just stripped to the  
waist and washed down, and then came over and knelt beside me.  I still  
don't know if you knew I was watching you; you never give anything away.  

"You rested one hand on the back of my neck and just rubbed me until I  
felt every muscle in my back unclench.  I was almost liquid under your  
fingers when you let me go and started washing my hair.  It felt so  
good, your fingers and the warm water and very bright sunlight coming in  
through the high windows.  When you'd rinsed me, you took a cloth and  
dried my face off, and you cupped my cheek and looked at me until I  
couldn't remember to breathe.  And then you dressed and left.

"I sat there until the water was colder than the room.  You had bathed  
me like that before, but not for years.  I was far too old for it, but  
the only thing that occurred to me at the time was a massive joy that  
you still loved me."

Silence.  He could feel Qui-Gon's eyes on him in the dark, and could see  
the man's silhouette in the nighttime Coruscant brilliance that filtered  
thinly through the tinted view.

"How dare you.  How dare you let me love you if you were only going to  
give me up."

"I never stopped loving you," Qui-Gon said.  "You have been the centre  
of my life for a dozen years.  When you were a child, you would curl  
yourself against my body and sleep there, letting your shields come down  
so that I could read your dreams.  I do not sleep securely until I know  
where you are.  I did not search the entire Temple for you on a whim."

The wall against Obi-Wan's back was cool.  Not cold in the way that a  
ship's bulkhead was cold, but stripped from the night air and the  
extreme altitude of the Temple.  It would have felt good against his  
face, raw as it was.  His skin ached from the time he'd spent crying.

"Come here, my Obi-Wan."

It took him a long time to straighten each of his joints and cross the  
space to kneel in front of his master.  It was a reflexive response to  
the command.  He would have preferred to stay protectively wrapped  
around himself on his pallet, but years of training brought him over,  
arranged him on his knees, and brought his hand out to touch his  
Master's feet in the small ritual of respect he'd learned as a tiny boy.    
Fingers touched the back of Obi-Wan's head and traced around to his  
ears.  He didn't raise his face.  

"You have grown into a creature so beautiful that at times I do not  
recognize you.  I do see you as you are now, but I also see you as you  
were.  Sometimes I forget the child, and sometimes I forget the man.    
For both these lapses I am sorry."  The fingers had descended to his  
neck, warm against the chilled edges of his skin.  He leaned into the  
touch, relaxing as Qui-Gon spoke.  "You are going to be a magnificent  
knight."

Obi-Wan's posture was naturally bent in his kneeling position, and it  
was entirely simple for him to complete the bow and bury his face in his  
Master's knees.  The fingers against his neck held him there, and  
relaxed only a little when he straightened and raised his face to look  
at the older man.

"I wonder," Obi-Wan said, "does it seem so odd to you that I might love  
you as much?"  Qui-Gon only watched him inquisitively.  "Why push me  
away?"

"I have given you my reasons."

"No.  You were talking about love.  I'm talking about sex.  I kissed  
you and you pushed me.  Do you love me?"

"I love you."  Ripples of psychic tolerance were the only force  
rendering the conversation at all comfortable.  He'd grown used to this  
extra communication between Jedi; he wondered if the absence of it was  
what made him awkward around strangers.

"Do you want me?"

A chuckle.  "I would be a fool not to.  I sometimes think I was given a  
houri rather than an apprentice.  Strangers turn to watch you in the  
streets."

"Then why?"

"I will not have you only because you are tired and needy, Padawan."    
The statement was oddly fierce.  His Master's honour had flared, but so  
had his pride. *I will not have you for pity.*

Very slowly, very clearly.  "What do you want?"

"I want you to come to me as an adult, fully cognisant of what you do  
and what it means."  Big hands slid from Obi-Wan's neck to his  
shoulders, gently pulled him to his feet and over to the blankets.  "I  
will not have you in any other way.  Now go to bed."

He sat, quietly, while Qui-Gon stripped and settled down to sleep.    
Years of meditation had taught him to sit inhumanly still, and in the  
darkness of his corner, he knew he was nearly invisible to his Master.    
When the older man had quieted, Obi-Wan gathered his blankets and  
shifted them the few feet necessary to put himself close against the  
bed.  He settled again by reflex.  He hadn't slept on the pallet since  
his last stay on Coruscant, but it was still very much his, and it  
wrapped around him with the familiar comfort of his own bed.  

Softly, "Obi-Wan, come and sleep with me."  He hadn't realized that Qui-  
Gon was still awake.  One big hand had slipped over the edge of the bed  
to touch him, tracing the line of his side from shoulder to hip.

It wasn't an offer he was going to refuse.  Qui-Gon had shifted back  
against the wall to make room for him, and a massive arm closed around  
his waist as Obi-Wan settled against the older man's body.  Warm fingers  
slipped into the front of his outsized robe and rubbed his belly gently,  
more intimate than the touch would have been when he was a child, but  
still entirely comforting.  The heat of the contact relaxed him,  
finally, and he drifted, buried in his Master's smell and too tired to  
generate thoughts about anything more complicated than sleep.


End file.
